Gerald Maclennon's Blog, page 4

The Purpose of Life, as far as I can tell

Every night, just about every person on this planet slips away for several hours into that mysterious realm we call sleep. Some do it in the light of day. We don’t think much about it because it’s a pattern of life that began at birth and will just continue on and on until our bodies once again turn to dust. While awake we are occupied with all the concerns of life. In our deepest period of sleep, nothing matters. In that nether world of bliss, we don’t concern ourselves with religion and politics, war and peace, appointments and obligations, relationships and associations, sustenance and economics.

Awake for only about 70-percent of our lives, the rest of that time is lost – wasted, some would say – in a regenerative state.

So, how do we humans define purpose while in our 70-percent… our fully conscious state? What is our raison d’etre – our reason for existence? From a mundane perspective, the purpose of life is to sustain and perpetuate life: to gather and hunt and feed our bodies, to reproduce and raise progeny, to provide a safe and secure nesting area, to acquire territory and possessions, to protect ourselves from enemies. That makes us humans no different than any other animal species. We just do it with greater intellect.

The most recurring theme in the world’s news and entertainment media is death – especially violent death. Why are we so fascinated with death? Because it is the one great mystery that all of us, the living, share. Yet, we’re not so unlike a herd of antelope that silently gather around the body of one of their own dead. They cautiously advance, one by one, and sniff the carcass – bewildered as to why their companion is no longer moving and breathing.

Having said all this, it is obvious to me that there is no purpose to life... unless there is more to life than life as we know it.

Christians find hope in the story of the death and resurrection of Jesus the Christ because, to them, it once and for all time, answers the question: “Is there life after death?”

Muslims and Jews maintain that adherence to the commandments of their respective holy books – the Quran and the Torah – will earn them respected positions in the Afterworld. Devotees of Eastern religions believe that our souls are repeatedly reincarnated until we reach a state of spiritual perfection that will allow us passage into Nirvana. And, of course, some say that there is no meaning to life and that physical death is the absolute end of who we are. Personally, if I carried that philosophy, I would stop marching in formation as if this world made sense and either live a life of crime and debauchery or merely end the cosmic joke by firing a bullet into my head.

Most of us older folks, as we mature, come to grips with the inevitability of death but still the question remains: What is the purpose of it all?

Seers, prophets and messiah kings throughout history have admonished us to minimize possessions – to cleanse ourselves of material non-necessities – so that we may open our eyes to the loftier humanitarian values that provide true meaning to this earthly journey.

Islam, Judaism and Christianity all teach that reverent submission to the One, Self-Existent God brings fulfillment and purpose to life. Christians add that the path to submission must pass through the Son of God, Jesus.

Siddhartha Gautama – the Buddha – gave us eight directives on how to conduct our lives while incarnated on this mortal plane. He taught that through personal application of the Noble Eightfold Path we find meaning and purpose. Confucius and Lao-Tzu also formulated belief systems for finding fulfillment.

No doubt there is truth in all these paths.

Allow me to ask at this juncture: what is the most euphoric event in a man or woman’s life. Most of us would agree it’s the experience of falling in love with that one special person whom we consider our soul mate. Falling in love is the theme of a million songs worldwide. Romantic love lifts up our spirits to the heavens; it permeates with elation every thread in the fabric of our being. It is a uniquely human experience. Animals don’t fall in love; they merely select, mate and breed. And… I might add, some humans do that too, but for them, it’s a deliberate choice.

Those who are most devoted to their particular faith have literally fallen in love (Agapao - Gr.) with God or an earthly manifestation that represents God, be it nature, a holy shrine, a book of sacred writings, and/or a person such as the Christ or the Buddha. Agape is the highest love and when one is enraptured by it, it produces in the individual a secondary level of affection and compassion: philato, the love of family, friends, neighbors and all humanity – even enemies.

Jesus of Nazareth imparted to his followers three directives that when personally applied are said to imbue every devotee of Christianity with a resolute purpose for living: first, know that there is but one God – the Self-Existent One; secondly, love that God with all of your heart, mind and spirit; and third, love your fellow human beings as much as – or even more than – yourself. This is not a uniquely Christian raison d’etre. It can be universally applied to virtually all religions as well as to individual credos.

No one knows when the end of his or her mortal existence will come – maybe a minute from now, tomorrow, months or years but one thing is certain: it will come to all. I believe that human spirit energy – the soul, if you will – continues to exist following departure of our highly-evolved primate bodies.

And, what can we take with us when we fly away to the next realm of consciousness? Not our prized possessions nor our accumulated wealth; not our power nor our prestige. All we’ll be able to pack is Love and the spiritual benefits we earned by conveying and implementing that Love while we occupied the flesh.

Some of us, in order to keep food on the table, a roof over our heads and heat in winter have no choice other than to accept a job we know upfront is going to be very boring – certainly not even close to personal fulfillment. Sad to say, not everything we do can be profound – I’ve been there too — but it can be done with love and graciousness. That’s the difference.

At the end of life, many take personal inventory; they look back to review their accomplishments and their failures; to know what other people really think of them. When death is imminent, does it matter that you worked your way up to the top level of management before retiring? Does it matter that you were able to afford a million dollar house and two luxury cars? Does it matter that you were a great scientist, a movie star, a talented artist, a powerful politician, a registered nurse, a four-star general, professional athlete or a damned good plumber?

Well of course it matters! Why would God not want us to have some fun while fulfilling our purpose? A long-faced, grumpy old Zeus is not the God of joy and happiness that I know. The way I see it, it ain’t so much what we do, as it is how we do it? We don’t have to be, nor should we be, Mother Teresa’s and Father Flanagan’s in order to say “I made a difference in this world!”

Is there a purpose for being? Well, yeah, I hope so! As the Apostle said long ago: “What we are seeing though dirty, greasy eyeglasses right now will be sharp and crystal clear once we have passed through that mysterious transition we call death.”

At the end of the road, if we have carried out our particular calling and shed the light of Godly love into the hearts of others through compassionate and selfless giving... if we even halfway lived in that manner, our mission, our purpose was achieved.

So to neatly wrap it all up, I say yes, as far as I can tell… Love is the purpose.

The purpose is Love. God is Love. Messiah came to us in Love, teaching us each to Love the L-RD our God with all our hearts, minds and souls. And, to love and respect our neighbors even as we do ourselves.

Love. It might just be that simple.


Gerald Logan-MacLennon, 67, January 2015 -- from my book, Wrestling with Angels: An anthology of prose & poetry 1962 thru 2016 Revised

Malignant / Benign Thoughts. May Day 2019

May Day. International Workers Day... ah, everywhere except Canada and the United States.

I did my quarterly blood draw, lab and Telemed visit yesterday with my oncologist, Dr. Apar Kishor Ganti. All systems are go. The creatinine is a bit high... that's associated with kidney function. They were damaged 5 years ago when malignant tumors blocked the flow creating the acute renal failure. Fortunately chemotherapy and dialysis got the boys up and running again but not without a little damage. I'm just happy they're functioning. Thanks again to my beloved Army of Prayer Warriors. You helped me piss off my hospice team.

Yesterday, after the Telemed at the VA Clinic, sitting and sipping at a new Starbucks on East O Street, I discussed a European trip with Sandy for the first time... told her how I'd like to make that trip that Mom never realized... the one to Sweden, home of great-great-grandparents (stormormor) and a few 2019 cousins.

America's New Age of Anti-Reason

This short article by one Ray Williams seized my attention in the year 2014. In it, he explains the very real dangers of a nation being ruled by social media mentality. I believe Willams has hit the proverbial nail on the head. Ergo... I place it on my blog

We're creating a nation of dummies... angry dummies who feel they have the right, the authority and the need not only to comment on everything, but to make sure their voice is heard above the rest, and to drag down any opposing views through personal attacks, loud repetition and confrontation.

Bill Keller, writing in the New York Times argues that the anti-intellectual elitism is not an elitism of wisdom, education, experience or knowledge. The new elite are the angry social media posters, those who can shout loudest and more often, a clique of bullies and malcontents baying together like dogs cornering a fox. Too often it's a combined elite of the anti-intellectuals not those who can voice the most cogent, most coherent response.

Together they foment a rabid culture of anti-rationalism where every fact is suspect; every rational thought is the enemy; where critical thinking is a tool of the devil.

Keller also notes that the herd mentality takes over online; the anti-intellectuals become the metaphorical equivalent of an angry lynch mob when anyone either challenges one of the mob beliefs or posts anything outside the mob's self-limiting set of values.

This growing mob of imbeciles accepts without questioning, believes without weighing the choices, joins the pack because in a culture where convenience rules, real individualism is "too much hard work"... thinking takes too much time. It gets in the way of the immediacy of social media... of the online experience.

-- from an article by Ray Williams, Psychology Today, June 2014

ATLAS SHRUGGED THE WORLD: Another Look at Ayn Rand’s Classic

As long as a man draws breath, it is never too late to change one’s pattern of thinking – his paradigm of reasoning. Perhaps a Russian-born, Jewish woman has altered mine to some degree.

Case in point is the classic novel of Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged, and her ingenious dramatization of her controversial social philosophy that came to be known as Objectivism. I remember well the frenzy of public reaction when this book was first released in 1957. The name, Ayn Rand, was the subject of many heated debates whenever and wherever learned men and women came together.

Unfortunately, I was only ten years old at that time with a brain full of mush, desperately seeking a philosophy of basic survival in a household dominated by my father, Neal Edward -- a poor man from a poor Scots-Irish family who demonstrated through his mannerisms and deeds that it was my destiny as his son to never hope for anything more in life than mediocrity. My so-called teenage rebellion took the form of an existential revolt against his abiding mindset. During that period of time, I did thumb through the book, Atlas Shrugged, but realized it was years beyond my comprehension. To be fair to the memory of my ‘old man,’ I must admit that he did teach me a noble work ethic. These were his words, “there is no reason for any able-bodied man to ever be on the public dole, son. There is no job too low... ditch digging, cleaning shitters, whatever. The biggest disgrace is to take charity just because you think you’re too damned good to get your hands dirty.”

He lived by those words… and so have I. Additionally, I must say, if not for the faith and encouragement of my mother and her parents, I probably would have been dragged down into the gutter by my father’s nonsensical lack of self-worth. Today, psychologists agree, for the most part, that male children tend to gain their self-esteem by drawing upon the honor and esteem of their fathers – the converse also being true.

By the time I did begin to discover my own identity, around twenty, I had drifted off into mysticism and the sort of hippie socialist mindset that Rand demonizes in her works; therefore, in obedience to the influence of my peers, I came to regard her as the enemy without even reading one chapter of her writings, nor investigating how and why she arrived at her motivational philosophy. That was my loss, and my penalty for dropping out of college after only one year of freshman prerequisites.

Now in my sixties, it is much too late in life for regrets. My mind is sharper than ever, but – as time and fate would have it – that brain is housed within a deteriorating shell.

Ayn Rand is the pseudonym for one Alisa Rosenbaum, born in Czarist Russia, witness to the Bolshevik Revolution, student of Marxist-Leninist indoctrination. At first, her intellectual power helped her gain access to the highest institutions of learning, but as the false altruistic ideal of communism took its natural path through Soviet society, her intelligence became a liability to the Dictatorship of the Proletariat. She was ultimately denounced as one of the undesirables: a not-to-be-trusted member of the Intelligentsia.

It was then that she made her escape to the United States of America and to New York City specifically. Her mind continued its relentless search for meaning as she examined firsthand the practical applications of capitalism in a free society. Her education continued under the flag of personal liberty.

Drawing upon her real life experiences, she brought to her most famous of writings – Atlas Shrugged and its predecessor, The Fountainhead – an authenticity unparalleled by few other novelists of her time. The appeal of her writing is not just in the philosophical realm however. Her superior skill as an author causes the characters in her stories to take on real flesh. The reader is allowed to develop an intimate kinship with each lead, fully understanding the inner workings of his or her mind and the outward manifestation of such reasoning.

After reading the book, I understand the title. Atlas represents the great minds of the world, those who constitute the motive power of civilization: inventors, scientists, entrepreneurs, industrialists, business geniuses, revolutionary artists… basically those with the brain power and motivation to make life better not only for themselves but for the entire civilized world. Such great minds, according to the author, constitute Atlas, the Greek god who supports the world on his shoulders despite the fact that the majority of those living on the surface of the planet tend to hate Atlas because he is, in their words, “an unscrupulous capitalist, a fat cat, a greedy rich man, an exploiter of the weak, a man who lives like a king while the poor and needy wallow in their own despair, a man who has more money than he needs or deserves.”

Because of those perceived sins of Atlas, he is punished by a so-called just society by being taxed up to, and sometimes beyond, 50 per cent of his profits. Punitive regulations and controls are placed on him by corrupt politicians.

Ayn Rand asks the questions: What if Atlas reached the end of his patience? What would happen to civilization if Atlas decided on his own volition to no longer support the world? What if, Atlas shrugged and dropped the world? The results, as you can imagine, are disastrous, and that's where the story goes.

In 1961, if, instead of Lutheran Catechism class at fifteen, I had been taught the Objectivist philosophy, my life may have taken a much more prosperous direction but alas, I have dedicated the bulk of my years striving for that which I thought was righteousness in the eyes of the Judeo-Christian God – and in so doing, have reduced myself to a virtual pauper at the age of desired retirement. My Christian friends, relatives and associates assuage my frustration by telling me that my rewards, my crowns, will come to me in heaven. Maybe so… but it would be nice to achieve some more rewards while still walking upon the earth.

Throughout my life, many have said to me in disdain, “You, Logan, think you are better than anyone else!” That is incorrect. My goal, and that of Ayn Rand, is to “think better than anyone else.” It’s an unattainable goal but the nobility is in the trying. It is not unlike the Christian who aspires to be more Christ-like or the Jewish man or woman who aspires to implement Tikkun Olam, the healing and repairing of the world.

Returning to Ayn Rand’s hypothesis… Can Christian dogma hybridize with an Objectivist epistemology? Has it? I am not enough of a scholar to know. The indoctrination of my youth taught me that one of the greatest virtues is selflessness, not selfishness; and that a man’s noblest pursuit is to fulfill the needs of the poor and disenfranchised of society.

My Catechism teacher emphasized that such was the abiding philosophy of Jesus the Christ and that it was also required of me if I was to become one of his confirmed followers. Ayn Rand’s moral position, on first reading, seems to stand in direct opposition to the programming of my youth. The supreme hero of her novel – her übermensch, if you will – is a genius named John Galt. In two instances of Atlas Shrugged, he expresses Rand’s fundamental belief in succinct and to-the-point affirmations:

“I swear by my life and my love of it that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine."

“[I refuse] to be born with any original sin. I have never felt guilty of my ability. I have never felt guilty of my mind. I have never felt guilty of being a man. I accepted no unearned guilt, and thus was free to earn and to know my own value.”

On level with Galt is an amazing woman, Dagny Taggart -- smart, shrewd, fearless -- a woman enjoying all the perks of leadership as CEO of Taggart Railroad Lines, a position she and her brother inherited upon the death of their father, and of which Dagny ultimately took full control when her brother's foolish decisions nearly plunge the company into ruin. Dagny Taggart is a woman before her time -- an icon of what women were destined to become three decades later. Author Ayn Rand saw the future.

The dominant themes of Atlas Shrugged are Rand’s answer to the questions: What would happen to the United States of America if the Marxist mindset took over all strata of government? What would happen if public education began to ingrain the doctrines of socialism into our children’s minds?

This is why I chose to step back in time to read Atlas Shrugged – because the voting majority of my country and yours has indeed been seduced by the false promises of redistribution of the wealth, by the utopian delusion that a strong, powerful central government can and will supply all needs to all people, no matter their social status.

In the 2008 presidential campaign, our ears were tickled by the Democratic candidate’s vocalized promise to provide all manners of comforts and securities for U.S. citizens regardless of race, creed, color, ethnic origins, sexual preference, motivation or ability to reason one’s way out of a soggy, cardboard box. It was a major expansion on the ages-old political ploy promising a chicken in every pot, a milk cow in every barn. And to receive these wonderful gifts, all one has to do is forfeit his liberties, bit by bit, one at a time. It smacks of cult leaders who have always known that there are plenty of sheep who are pleased to have someone else do their thinking for them.

Mental Blanks, as Rand calls them, are happy as long as they have their monthly public assistance check, their cable and satellite televisions, online streaming... as long as they have plenty of snacks, alcoholic beverages, recreational drugs, indiscriminate sexual opportunity, internet pornography and – most important of all, no bag of hot air telling them all such hedonistic pleasures are meaningless in the long run.

Atlas Shrugged remains just as significant today as when it was first published in 1957 – perhaps more so. It most definitely deserves its status as a classic of American literature if only for the fact that it requires the reader to employ a full measure of his critical thinking skills. For me, there was much more to like than to dislike in Atlas Shrugged. Any novel that pulls a person away from the mundane, from the tyranny of the dailies, and provokes him or her to think outside "socially acceptable" parameters, while couching it within a very compelling and entertaining story, is well worth one’s time commitment.

Gerald Logan MacLennon, 62, April 2009, Rio Grande Valley, Texas

Flight of the Intruder by Stephen Coonts

BLOODY SIXTEEN written by CDR Peter Fey, USN-retired, inspired me to buy and read FLIGHT OF THE INTRUDER written by his friend and fellow Navy Pilot, Stephen Coonts.

The purchase was something I should have done 33 years ago when Coonts first published it. I don't recall why I did not. Perhaps it was because the movie, Flight of the Intruder, was so bad, I figured the book would be, also. Wrongo. The book is a great study on the emotions and attitudes of the pilots. I didn't realize they were as pissed off as I was regarding the s**t targets of North Vietnam... risking their lives, for example, by taking out a grove of trees where military trucks might be hiding... but usually weren't.

I looked at the Wikipedia page regarding this great book and the not-so-great film -- both entitled FLIGHT OF THE INTRUDER. I had to chuckle when I read about Stephen Coonts' effort to get published, because I've 'been there, done that' as well. Back in the 80's, he sent manuscripts and letters of inquiry to 36 publishers... 30 refused to look at it, 4 rejected it, and today, he's still waiting to hear back from 2 of them. Ha, as if he really cares. Ultimately the book was published by United States Naval Institute Press, Annapolis. And as follow-up, Coonts received a valuable endorsement of his book by bestselling author, Tom Clancy, and then, unexpectedly, favorable comments by then sitting president, Ronald Reagan, which sent sales skyrocketing. Clancy endorsed Coonts. Coonts endorsed Fey.

I've often said... I wonder where the pilots went when in port at Subic & Cubi Point. Author Fey touched on it briefly... of course, the Cubi Officers Club. They were equal to us enlisted grunts... Hell, more so in drunken antics. Author Coonts goes into that in detail. Funny thing is... even though I lived at Naval Air Station Cubi Point, Philippines, for a year, I had no idea (still don't) where the Cubi Point Officers Club was located -- probably up on a distant hilltop surrounded by jungle... far out of earshot.

FLIGHT OF THE INTRUDER... here Coonts expressed the guilt he feels/felt for killing people who are not the real enemy, such as poor rice farmers. He talks about how easy, how sanitary it is, to release his bombs and fly away, noticing only a puff of smoke in the distance... and how he intentionally blocked thoughts of little girls' bodies being ripped apart by the force of the bomb explosions.

It does my heart good to know the pilots had these very human emotions. Once, during our 1967 deployment, my photo recon squadron mis-targeted a building. The photo interpreters said it was for ammunition storage. On our recommendation, the attack birds took it out. BDA revealed it could have been a schoolhouse full of kids. Unsure. That still bugs me... brings tears to my eyes. And I was not the pilot but I was one cog in the gears of the killing machine. Maybe if it really was a just war (by political science definition) I would have felt okay about the killing and destruction. Probably not.

[SPOILER ALERT]

I can understand why Jake Grafton (READ: Coonts) wanted to disobey orders by flying directly into downtown Hanoi, dropping his bombs on Communist Party Headquarters instead of dropping them on peasants who were just as horrified by the senselessness of the Vietnam Air War as Jake was... as I was.

You see, because president LBJ and his henchmen were micromanaging the war from the White House VIP dining room, the majority of strategic targets were declared off-limits. The general attitude among those fighting the damn war was, "Let's either fight to win or get the hell out of here."

1975, after the deaths of 58,000 Americans, Presidents Nixon and then Ford finally threw in the towel. What an embarrassment.

-- Gerald Logan MacLennon

Easter / Pesach 2019 & John Fugelsang

RE: John Fugelsang's famous "Jesus Quotes".

In my Hebraic studies I've had several revelations... Y'shua (his correct name in Aramaic, a contraction of Yahoshua/ Joshua) when compared to the right wing religious ruling party in Jerusalem (the Parushim / Pharisees) was indeed a liberal with radical ideas... like the simplicity by getting right with Ha Shem (G-D) without having to follow a long list of do's and don'ts and hundreds of Kashrut / Kosher petty rules and regs, especially dietary. That pissed off the religious elite who made big bucks off subjugated "commoners".

Then this rabbi from Ha Galil / the District (Galilee) had the cajones to kick the money changers and sacrificial dove sellers out of the Temple just before Pesach / Passover. No wonder the Jewish high priest, Kaiafas ben Yosef / Caiaphas, wanted this rebel strung up, crucified or simply 'disappeared'.

Rav. Y'shua did condone a communitarian (read: kibbutzim) lifestyle for his followers... the early Christian / Messianic / Nazarene / Ebionite communities did just that: held all things in common... from those according to their abilities to those according to their needs just as today's Kibbutz system in Yisrael does. Although, over the past half-century, they've become somewhat capitalist with their 4-star hotels.

One thing about the so-called New Covenant bothers me, though, and that is the fact that nobody, not even Y'shua, nor his disciples, nor the Apostle Paul condemned slavery. Regarding Paul, in this and other matters, some critics have cynically remarked he never met a status quo he didn't like.

Some of those comments in John Fugelsang's list are anachronistic silliness - not worth the effort to analyze. That said, I do enjoy actor/comedian Fugelsang's monologues even if we don't always agree.

G.Logan Apr 2019

An Airdale's perspective on Peter Fey's Bloody Sixteen

Bloody Sixteen: The USS Oriskany and Air Wing 16 during the Vietnam War

The "Bloody Sixteenth" was my air wing (CVW-16) onboard the carrier USS Oriskany. My squadron was VFP-63 or Photo Reconnaissance Squadron-63. Now, thanks to retired naval aviator, Commander Peter Fey, I have a totally new understanding of that of which I was a part... and a newfound respect for the officers and pilots I rubbed shoulders with on a daily basis. I had no idea Operation Rolling Thunder and CVW-16 on CVA-34 were so historically significant - maybe no one at the time actually did. Maybe 50 years had to expire before military historians, such as Fey, could look back and see the big picture without the 'fog of war' obstructing the view.

Fey recalls that many of the pilots, same as many of the enlisted ranks, didn't talk much to others about their Vietnam experience once they rejoined civilian life. Older Americans of the mid-twentieth-century -- those that had hailed victories in Europe and the Western Pacific during World War II -- did not want to admit our nation could be defeated anywhere on the world stage.. but it was. To his credit author Peter Fey is quick to point out that our losses in Vietnam were due to no weakness of the men and women fighting the war; their strength and resolve remained true to the bitter end.

I thank you, Mister Fey, sir, for allowing me a privileged seat today on the tower of history. Up here, I can better see the entire sprawling vista. Because of Bloody Sixteen this old guy, who was a 20-year-old Petty Officer 3rd Class in 1967, has been allowed an eagle's eye view to events that influenced my entire life after Vietnam; and greatly influenced our nation's future decisions based on what we learned in the Vietnam War.

I think I first heard this bromide in a Filipino bar while chugging San Miguel beers with a shipmate... it goes like this: "The old war veterans talk about the glory of it. The politicians talk about the necessity of it. But, the soldiers and sailors living it... they just want to go home."

At 72, I now qualify as an old veteran but I still see very little glory in that war. I kept a daily diary throughout my 1967-68 cruise to Yankee Station, Gulf of Tonkin because I wanted to remember not only the glory... but all the disappointments too. And there's even more of that than I thought. Peter Fey details the sloppy mismanagement of the war by high-level military leaders; even more so by US President Lyndon Johnson, Secretary McNamara and the other "whiz kids" left over from JFK's administration. They met every Tuesday noon for lunch at the White House where strategy and targets were determined for the upcoming week without any Pentagon officers present. LBJ wanted to run the war without generals and admirals getting in the way.

Primary focus of Bloody Sixteen is on Commissioned Flight Officers of the US Navy, an elite brotherhood of aviation professionals. The book is a tactical analysis of their missions in the Vietnam War, individually and overall. The non-commissioned and enlisted men are generally relegated to their subservient status. As for the North Vietnamese, during the three years of Operation Rolling Thunder, it is estimated non-combatants (men, women, children) were killed at a rate of 1,000 per month. These human beings, mostly farmers, were generally seen as statistical consequences of war -- 'collateral damage' in military parlance. To me that seems cold-hearted. But then again, war is not about hugs and warm fuzzies.

In this story, passion, empathy, sympathy and tugs of the heart are reserved for naval aviators, their missions, their downings by AAA or SAM's, their status as KIA, MIA or POW and their US Naval Aviation legacies. If that's what you want in a book, then this is the book you want. Better than any video game, kids, this is war in the raw.

Bloody Sixteen is destined to become one of the best military histories of the Vietnam War. I wholeheartedly agree with naval aviator and best-selling author Stephen Coonts when he called Peter Fey's work, "Magnificent, superbly researched."

If it is deceit, it certainly is well-crafted

The Day After Roswell After reading for a second time, Colonel Philip Corso's intriguing exposé, so to speak, of how the UFO crash in 1947 actually did occur... and why it was so quickly relegated to the deep darkness of military ultra-crypto classification... I must admit, if it is deceit, it certainly is well-crafted deceit.

Having worked in US Navy Fleet Intelligence during the Vietnam War, I am familiar with the "shop talk" that goes on inside such military departments as Colonel Corso describes in this riveting book.

His claims, along with well-researched documentation, give any skeptic-self included-serious food for thought. I've heard the many criticisms of Phil Corso and his revelation that several of humankind's scientific, electronic, communication advances in the last half of the twentieth century are linked to US Army Air Corps discoveries inside the unidentified air or space craft near Roswell, New Mexico in July of 1947. Let the reader be the judge. Corso tells, in great detail, how alien technology was secretly dispersed to America's top civilian R&D labs and manufacturers - how it was back-engineered to become pivotal elements of the Computer Revolution.

After reading Corso's accounts, I'm left with more questions than answers... and, I must admit, a little bit spooked about what the future could be for my grandchildren in this new millennium... if his claims are indeed true.

Proof of Heaven by Neurosurgeon Eban Alexander MD, PhD

Upon completion of this book (13 Apr 2017) I didn't know quite what to think of the good doctor's journey into the unknown. It seemed more like hell than it did heaven. I experienced the same feeling of spiritual betrayal that I had after watching director Tim Burton's Beetlejuice (1988) starring Michael Keaton. Such an existential emptiness... I felt sorry for impressionable youth exposed to such cinematic heresy.

On 13 Apr 2017, I wrote a letter to Dr. Eban Alexander - hoping against all hope he would reply. But he didn't. The letter comments:

Regarding your decision, doctor, to use "Om", I propose the Hebrew Yod-Hey-Vav-Hey or YHVH more accurately conveys the nature of the Self-Existent One. I propose that Prince of Egypt, Moshe, knew precisely why he chose that triple verb conjugation of hayah (to be; exist). Defined, it means essentially "I was, I am, I always will be." There is no gender assignment. It is spirit. It defies concepts of time and space, as you experienced, and later tried to explain in words that seemed inadequate, the "awe of the Core". In my opinion, it is the universal connectedness of everything, as you suggested... as quark mechanics theorizes.

Doctor, there is much more depth to Judaism than what is presented to the world; so too the Jewish Rabbi bearing the name of Yesha-Yah-u (meaning, the liberation of spirit provided by YHVH).

In 2014, I was near death but came back. Why? I don't know for sure but I think my small army of prayer warriors had something to do with it.

Academically, I am no one special. I am not a worldly success story by any stretch. Still, I feel a certain kinsmanship with you because of our experiential similarities.

There was a secondary formal name the Deity conveyed to Moshe. It was, "Aehyeh Asher Aehyeh" meaning "I am continually becoming what I am becoming". To most people that would seem like gibberish but I have a hunch you understand exactly what it means.

Happiness

Happiness could not be discerned if it were a constant. We only recognize and thereby appreciate it when it manifests – as it always does – in moments. Only contentment has a fighting chance of becoming a permanent state of being. Basically it is in the striving for ecstatic moments that we fine tune our minds and sensitize our hearts toward that valiant goal, just as all ideologists find dignity in attempting to bring into full existence their cherished visions.

Cheaters attempt to circumnavigate responsibility via psychotropic drugs, excessive alcohol consumption and promiscuous sexual encounters. Such delusionists may experience a temporary but false joy but not a genuine reorganization of mental paradigms that create true and long-lasting contentment.

Gerald Logan-MacLennon, 62,
2009 Rio Grande Valley, Texas